Smartphones Lead Fast-Growing Mobile Internet Device Category

Smartphones and e-book readers like the new Amazon Kindle 2, along with UMPCs, netbooks, gaming devices and mobile satellite navigation systems, make up a new category of fast-growing devices known as MIDs. Small screens, high speed and reliable battery life are the names of the game. In addition, companies such as Intel, with its Atom processors, and Nvidia are looking to define this still developing market.

Size matters, and it's a good time to be small. New data from iSuppli
predicts that by 2012 the mobile Internet device category is expected to grow by
a factor of eight from 2007 numbers. Global shipments are set to rise to 416 million
units in 2012 - a compound annual growth rate of 50.8 percent from 2007, when
only 53.8 million shipped.

More specifically, iSuppli defines MIDs as devices that include integrated
connectivity for wireless LANs and 3G-or-better wireless WANs; have displays
that measure no more than 8 inches diagonally; feature instant-on and
always-connectable capabilities; and offer a typical day's worth of battery
life.

Smartphones are expected to dominate the category, with iSuppli estimating that
60 percent currently meet MID criteria and 100 percent will by 2012.

E-book readers, such as the
new Amazon Kindle 2, currently have 35 percent MID penetration-which
iSuppli expects will rise to 76 percent by 2012.

Only 2 percent of UMPCs currently fit the MID criteria, generally due to screen
size, instant-on capabilities and battery life, but this is expected to grow to
28 percent by 2012. iSuppli considered netbooks in its research, though most
were excluded due to screen size, instant-on capabilities and battery life.
However, as
improvements to battery life are made, more UMPCs are expected to reach MID
performance levels by 2012.

Only a small segment of gaming devices-many lack 3G-or-better connectivity
features-meet the MID criteria, with only 2.8 percent expected to be in the MID
category by 2012. And finally, portable navigation devices make up the smallest
segment of the market, with only 0.22 percent meeting MID requirements, though
10 percent is expected to join the MID category by 2012.

Michelle Maisto has been covering the enterprise mobility space for a decade, beginning with Knowledge Management, Field Force Automation and eCRM, and most recently as the editor-in-chief of Mobile Enterprise magazine. She earned an MFA in nonfiction writing from Columbia University, and in her spare time obsesses about food. Her first book, The Gastronomy of Marriage, if forthcoming from Random House in September 2009.